Staunton, March 24 – Yesterday marked the 30th anniversary of US President Ronald Reagan’s announcement of his strategic defense initiative, a program that quickly became known as Star Wars because of that movie’s references to the Evil Empire and one that played a major role in the demise of the Soviet Union.

While this anniversary passed virtually unnoticed in the United States – a search of Google news for Star Wars this morning called up references to the film but not SDI – it was recalled by some outlets in the post-Soviet states perhaps because of the far greater role in played in their history than it does in the current thinking of Americans.

Indeed, in the view of many experts in those countries, Reagan’s Star Wars program became a major cause of the demise of the Soviet Union. As one of them put it to the author of these lines several years ago, “Star Wars may not have been able to shoot a missile out of the sky, but it has succeeded in blowing a country off the face of the earth.”

Reagan’s futurist plan to create a defense shield on land and in space to block any incoming rockets was dismissed by many commentators in the West as something that could not be achieved except at enormous cost and over a lengthy period of time. But it was seen as a game changer by the Soviet leadership.

On the one hand, Star Wars, by making the US invulnerable to attack by Soviet missiles, effectively destroyed the notion of mutually assured destruction on which the Soviet-American balance of terror, the so-called mutually assured destruction principle, rested by rendering much of the Soviet arsenal irrelevant.

And on the other hand, for Moscow to respond with its own version of such a program was in itself a threat to the Soviet system. Not only would a Soviet SDI be enormously expensive and put a new burden on the Soviet economy, but it would require Moscow to do two things that would undermine the nature of the communist dictatorship.

Star Wars technology presupposed a huge telecommunications system and massive computerization, two areas the USSR could develop only at the cost of its totalitarian system since no such system could long tolerate decent telephone service or, even more, the appearance of powerful computers, at least some of which would be used by its citizens.

Thus, President Reagan effectively put the Soviet leadership in a bind: If it tried to counter Star Wars, it would effectively dig its own grave politically. But if it didn’t or couldn’t, Moscow would find its enormous nuclear arsenal and the power that gave the center at home and abroad seriously compromised.

Consequently, as a commentary on Irkutsk’s Babr.ru news site points out today, “despite its fantastic quality, the SDI project generated extreme concern in the USSR,” a trend that, in the words of the site, “strengthened Reagan and his command in the opinion that they were on the right path,” whatever the critics said (newsbabr.com/?IDE=113419).

In the United States and elsewhere, those critics were legion. Some suggested that the program was too expensive or would never work. Others pointed to the danger that terrorists could seize control of it and use it against the US. And still others suggested SDI was profoundly destabilizing because of its impact on the Soviet-American balance.

In the Soviet Union, Academician Andrey Sakharov led the public criticism of SDI by arguing that the program would not achieve its goals because its components could be rendered useless at an early stage of any nuclear conflict. But Sakharov’s words appear to have had a greater impact in the United States than in the Soviet Union, Babr.ru suggests.

In the US and under the impact of an increasingly skeptical public, Congress “step by step reduced spending on SDI and in the end closed down the program.” But in the USSR, Moscow launched a program under the direction of Academician Yevgeny Velikhov to build a Soviet version of Reagan’s vision.

At the same time, the USSR launched a diplomatic offensive, one that involved attacks on SDI as a program and proposals to talk about the military use of outer space and the placement of nuclear weapons there. Following talks in Geneva beginning in 1985, the two sides reached agreement on limiting the military use of space.

These accords represented a major victory for President Reagan and his SDI program even as it was being limited by Congressional action. But a still greater victory was ahead: Moscow continued to try to build its own version, a drive that put insupportable pressures on the Soviet system and contributed to its demise in 1991.

American missile defense programs over the last decade, Babr.ru implies, are an echo of Reagan’s Star Wars program. Like their predecessor, these programs and especially US plans to put such defense weapons in countries near the Soviet Union have been viewed “extremely negatively” by the Russian Federation.

But also like the situation of 30 years ago, a major reason for this anger is that “at the present time, “Russia having catastrophically fallen behind the US in the area of arms is not capable of an adequate response” to what the Americans are doing, a situation that just as a generation ago poses a serious challenge to the Russian leadership.

Staunton, March 24 – Vladimir Putin has said and thus many in Russia and the West are prepared to accept that his proposal for amalgamating Russia’s regions and eliminating the non-Russian republics is necessary for the effective administration of the country, one consistent with contemporary international practice and the interests of the Russian people.

But according to an analysis prepared by Nail Gilmanov, a Tatar commentator, the Russian president’s proposal represents a retrograde step to increase central control over the country’s reigons and one that “ignores world practice, the Russian Constitution, good sense” and the interests of Russian citizens (www.irekle.org/articles/i39.html).

He makes nine key arguments and provides extensive evidence in support of each...

Mr. Vitaly Milonov, a Russian politician, a deputy of St. Petersburg, Russia, city parliament and an author of infamous "anti-homosexual propaganda" law claimed in his official election biography in 1998 that he graduated in 1994 from HPU with the degrees in politics and economics. However it appears that he did not repeat this claim later, in his subsequent biographies. Please help us to clarify these facts:

Did Mr. Milonov attend HPU, did he graduate from it and with what degrees?

This information is important for understanding the degree of truthfulness and mentality of this rather unusual (some say "weird") politician.

Mr. Milonov, how can you explain this? Did you lie? Why? Don't you think that your homophobic stance might be a part of your tendency to lie? What other lies did you employ to advance your political carrier?

And is this not a ground for revoking Mr. Milonov's deputy status? And is this not a ground for recalling the infamous "anti-homosexual propaganda law", if its author is a certified liar? And how does this reflect on you, the esteemed St. Petersburg deputies and politicians, to have a person like this among you?

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the nation’s largest pediatricians group, came out in support of same-sex marriage and adoption on Thursday in a new policy statement.

Just a week before the Supreme Court hears two marriage equality cases, the AAP noted that a parent’s sexual orientation is not as important to a child as the family’s well-being and social and economic resources. The new national policy also advocates for the adoption or foster care of children by couples or individuals regardless of sexual orientation.

“Children thrive in families that are stable and that provide permanent security, and the way we do that is through marriage,” said Benjamin Siegel, MD, FAAP, chair of the AAP Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, and a co-author of the policy statement. “The AAP believes there should be equal opportunity for every couple to access the economic stability and federal supports provided to married couples to raise children.”

Scientific evidence affirms that children have similar developmental and emotional needs and receive similar parenting whether they are raised by parents of the same or different genders. If a child has 2 living and capable parents who choose to create a permanent bond by way of civil marriage, it is in the best interests of their child(ren) that legal and social institutions allow and support them to do so, irrespective of their sexual orientation. If 2 parents are not available to the child, adoption or foster parenting remain acceptable options to provide a loving home for a child and should be available without regard to the sexual orientation of the parent(s).

Critical factors that affect the normal development and mental health of children are parental stress, economic and social stability, community resources, discrimination, and children’s exposure to toxic stressors at home or in their communities — not the sexual orientation of their parents, the AAP said in a statement.

“The AAP has long been an advocate for all children, and this updated policy reflects a natural progression in the Academy’s support for families,” said Ellen Perrin, MD, FAAP, co-author of the policy statement. “If a child has two loving and capable parents who choose to create a permanent bond, it’s in the best interest of their children that legal institutions allow them to do so.”

Russia should join NATO: the benefits for the Global Security are enormous

To reformulate Lord Ismay's phrase: 1) Take Russia in, 2) Continue keeping Germany down, 3) Assert and exercise the US leadership position within the NATO as a unifying and directing force and vector.

"Ловец Человеков"

Connected? The halo is there. And the Book is there. And the disciples are there. But where is the Light of Understanding, in this big curved dark tunnel of a vision? Where is the big red dot? Where is the new beginning?

Russia and US Presidential Elections of 2016 - Google News

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RUSSIA and THE WEST

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West, Russia, Putin

US - Russia relations - Google News

Hillary Clinton and rock group Pussy Riot

"Great to meet the strong & brave young women from #PussyRiot, who refuse to let their voices be silenced in #Russia. 1:09 PM - 4 Apr 2014" - Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton tweeted a picture Friday of her posing with members of the anti-Vladimir Putin punk rock group Pussy Riot. Clinton met with the women during the "Women in the World Summit" in New York. The group has emerged as chief opponents of Putin, and three members were jailed in 2012 after an anti-Putin performance at a church. The tweet has been re-tweeted almost 10,000 times.